Task-focused: outside-in
The University of Antwerp's online environments are designed to be as task-focused and user-friendly as possible from the point of view of the visitor (outside-in).
Specific consequences:
- Information, tools and functionalities are organised as efficiently as possible, keeping the goals of the user in mind rather than a kind of organisational or systemic logic.
- Information, tools and functionalities that belong together in the outside-in approach are presented together in the online environment, even if different sections of the information, tools or functionalities are managed by different sections of the organisation.
Clarity of environments
Three main target groups – students, personnel and external visitors – are offered three distinct online environments:
- Student portal
- Personnel environment
- Website
Local (decentralised) content management, but with clear boundaries
Most content is managed by each environment separately.
Wherever a centralised manager does need to perform final editing or a check, workflows facilitating final editing are implemented in the content management system. At the moment, we use a workflow in the calendar and news items sections.
We aim to manage information at the source wherever possible.
We make as much use as possible of existing information sources (databases) within UAntwerp when developing our separate online environments. These information sources are kept correct and up-to-date using tried-and-tested procedures and workflows.
We aim to manage information in just one place wherever possible.
Information about similar topics is best managed in one place. This information can then be made available on various online platforms through links or linked content.
The web communications officer takes care to ensure that there is as little information overlap as possible.